40% Read Political Blogs

WSJ reported Two-fifths of Americans who are online have read a political blog, and more than a quarter read them once a month or more, according to a recent Harris Interactive poll. Still, 56% of the public has never read a political blog and only 7% of online adults have posted a comment, according to the poll. Of online adults who have posted comments on a political blog, 21% have posted 10 times or more in the past year. Half have posted between two and five times and 20% have posted only once. People who identify themselves as Liberals are mostly likely to post comments to political blogs (28%); Moderates (17%) and Republicans (17%) were least likely.

Joe Gandelman blogged The bottom line is what we've politely hinted at before: blogging is a new frontier. It has great potential. But the majority of Americans are not sitting at their computers reading political blogs. Many of us would certainly wish this was the case: in case you haven't figured it out, the people who write these blogs on the left, in the center and on the right basically don't make money on them, although the bigger ones do make some Big Bux on blog ads. Bloggs are a new form of citizen journalism so bloggers shouldn't be discouraged because of what this poll shows. Nor should they fall into the old pattern of now saying this poll is flawed, etc. People tend to embrace polls they agree with and try to discredit those they don't. The bottom line is that blogging is indeed "hot stuff" in journalism schools, to the media — and it's growing in readership and influence. This poll adds a little bit of humility to us all. (Of course, TMV is always humble as angry readers on the right and left vow never to return every time he takes a side they don't like). Blogs are today highly influential with a good, solid-starting base of readership but what you read here (and elsewhere) is unlikely to change the world. Yet.

Michelle Malkin blogged If there are 120 million Americans adults online, this survey suggests that 31 million Americans read a political blog at least once a month and 6 million Americans read a political blog at least once a day. This would mean that Instapundit is read by less than 3% of those who read political blogs on a daily basis. I don't believe it. I suspect the survey results would be quite different if respondents were informed that the Drudge Report, Slate, Free Republic, Democratic Underground, rushlimbaugh.com, and lucianne.com are not blogs. More: Sitemeter explains why tracking services often overstate the number of blog readers:

Taylor W. Buley blogged I think this is a positive trend toward transparency in government. Readers usually add blogs as a source of information instead of replacing msm all together, so that means that two fifths of Americans are today more politically savvy than they were before. It also tells me why this blog has relatively less comments than soem others of similar traffic and caliber. Any ideas about why conservatives are less likely to post comments?

Scott @PowerLine blogged What is the breakdown of left-wing moonbats versus right-wing nuts who obscenely project their fantasies of homosexual conduct on bloggers they wish to abuse? Based on our experience with the beating heart of the left, I bet that the answer to that question tilts astronomically toward the left-wing moonbats who hold themselves out as the guardians of civil liberties from the similarly imaginary depredations of George Bush and John Ashcroft. Unfortunately, however, that's the missing question from the Wall Street Journal's poll report: "Two fifths of Americans online have read political blogs."

Well Scott, I don't necessarilly agree with your characterization of bloggers on either side, but the poll shows Republican 45%, Democrat 47%, and Independent 43%; Conservative 48%, Moderate 46%, Liberal 52%.